Summary
Reviewing every guest after their stay improves your standing with channels and helps build guest reputations — but doing it manually is tedious. Host Tools can leave a 5-star review for you automatically using a message rule. You can also send guests a message 10 days after their stay, reminding them to leave a review if they haven't already.
You can also edit your review and star rating of a specific guest and schedule the review to send at the very end of the review window, which minimizes the time a guest has to write a retaliatory review in response to yours.
Auto-reviews use the same message rule system as messages, just with a "leave review" action attached.
Setting up an automatic review rule
Click Messaging in the header menu.
Choose the listing or listing group the rule should apply to.
Click Add Message Rule in the top right-hand corner.
From the Templates drop-down, select the Review Guest Rule template. This pre-fills the trigger event (checkout), the timing (1 day after checkout), and the review setting (Leave guest a 5-star review).
Adjust the message text the guest will receive (asking them to leave a review back).
Click Save.
Going forward, every reservation that meets the rule's conditions will receive an automatic review and a request-for-review message at the time you scheduled.
⚠️ Important: If you set the review to trigger before the channel's review window opens, the channel will reject it. For Airbnb, the review window opens at checkout and lasts 14 days. Leaving the review on the day after checkout (the template default) is a safe choice.
What if the guest has already reviewed me?
The accompanying message asking the guest to review you only sends if they haven't already reviewed. Once they have, Host Tools will skip the message — but the review-leaving action itself still fires according to the schedule (or at the last minute, if that's enabled).
Reminding Guests to leave a review 10 days after their stay if they have not yet reviewed you.
Many guests intend to leave reviews but are busy unpacking or getting back to "real life" after a trip. If you enable the message template "Remind Guest to Review Rule," you can send guests who have not yet reviewed you a reminder. You can use the default text we provide, or edit the message in any way you'd like.
Reviews are the best asset your listing has, and this helps you get more of them!
Editing the review and sending the review at the last minute (Airbnb only)
On Airbnb, you have a 14-day window to leave a review after a guest checks out. Both you and your guest can post reviews independently, and they're released only when both sides have written one (or when the window closes). If you submit your review early, it triggers the release of the guest's review of you, which can be a problem if the guest wants to retaliate.
Host Tools includes an option that delays your review until the very end of the window — sent one minute before the review period expires — so the guest has effectively no time to write a retaliatory review based on yours.
View your scheduled review of the guest by following these steps:
1. Click on "Inbox" in the header menu.
2. Choose the guest whose review you want to edit from the list on the left.
3. Scroll down to the bottom of the message thread and click "Show Scheduled Messages."
4. This will open all scheduled messages for this reservation. Scroll down to your review rule and then press this button to edit your review:
5. The "Customize Review" window will open. You can edit the review text, the star ratings, whether you would reccommend and then you can toggle "Send at last minute" to enabled. Host Tools will pick up Airbnb's exact expiration date for each reservation and submit your review one minute before that.
⚠️ Important: If you set the star ratings to 1 for communication, cleanliness, or house rules, you should also mention those things in the text of your review. If you do not state in the review that the guest was messy, broke house rules, or did not communicate well, then Airbnb may reject the review.
Does this work on Vrbo?
You can automate review messages on Vrbo using the same rule template, but the Send review at the last minute option is Airbnb-only. Vrbo doesn't expose an exact review-window expiration date through their API, so Host Tools schedules Vrbo reviews using the day/time you set, not a "last-minute" override.